Training - Part 1

Icarth slowly opened his eyes. Sitting up, he found himself relaxing on Nova's back.

"Morning Ica," Julian greeted.

"Mmm, morning gramps," Ica mumbled sleepily. He looked around, curious at why Emmia didn't immediately start to pester him.

"Where's Mia?" Ica asked.

"On top of Nova's snout," Julian gestured to the front where Emmia was having the time of her life as the wind rushed past her face. Nova was currently flying towards a location to train Emmia and Icarth. While he could have just gone through the spatial layers, it was at Emmia's request that he was flying through the skies.

Using his spatial manipulation to make sure that Emmia didn't fly off, Nova asked, "How is the ride, Mia?"

"It's great uncle Nova!" Emmia yelled excitedly.

Nova laughed, her excitement was truly infectious.

Observing Emmia's hair whipping to and fro from the wind, Icarth suddenly wondered, "Gramps, why is there so less wind over here?"

"I just made a small bubble to let you sleep a little more," Julian replied.

"...thanks gramps," Ica said softly. Pondering for a while he asked, "Hey gramps, can you do the things that uncle Nova does?"

"Like what?" Julian asked for confirmation.

"Like, open the sky, move long distances, and all that stuff," Ica clarified.

"Hmmm, unfortunately, no. I can only do smaller things like making this bubble for us," Julian answered.

"Then what about your hidden strength?" Ica asked innocently once more.

"Nova is that hidden strength," Julian grinned. "I told you I'm not that strong, it's just that you're too weak."

Icarth rolled his eyes and then laid back down, enjoying the clouds drifting by at high speeds.

"You're very talkative today," Julian commented. "Did you want to confirm my strength?"

Icarth didn't reply and closed his eyes to finally sort out that awful feeling that he felt when he first met uncle, Nova.

Julian just chuckled at Ica's actions and started thinking of a plan to train the twins. Suddenly remembering, Julian asked, "Ica, what's your gift?"

Ica remained silent for a while before mumbling, "I don't have one yet."

"What?" Julian was stunned. "What about Emmia?"

"She doesn't have one yet either," Ica responded.

'How can this be,' Julian thought. Usually, human children awaken their gifts at birth itself. They would only learn to utilise the gifts later in the future though.

"Can you check your mind for a second Ica?" Julian asked.

"What?" Ica was confused. What did 'check your mind' mean?

"I mean think really hard, there should be a memory that stands out from the rest," Julian clarified.

Icarth blinked and then did what Julian asked him to. He started to go through his memories. The beautiful sights yesterday, the food he ate, the time he met his grandpa, and even further back to his first memories of his sister, from hunger to sleepless nights.

As he concentrated, a certain memory became more and more prominent. Well, it wasn't a memory exactly. It was like he was in a blank space and there were some floating words in front of him.

Diving into the memory, Icarth found that the floating letters spelt out his name, Icarth Struze.....and that was it. Even though Icarth couldn't read yet, he could somehow understand the meaning of those floating words, as if it was ingrained in his head.

"Gramps, I can see my name," Icarth described. "And that's the only thing there."

Julian fell deep into thought. 'So he really isn't awakened? This adds to the odd traits that I've been observing. An acute sense of smell better than a human, being more mature as compared to other children, a higher intelligence than other 4-year-olds, odd sleeping times, and now not being awakened?' A loose theory started to form inside Julian's mind. But in the end, he shelved it and decided to make a conclusion based on more concrete evidence.

"Mia," Julian called. "Come here, I need to ask you something." Julian's voice rang out through the howling winds.

"Oh, grandpa is calling," Emmia exclaimed, "I'll be back uncle Nova!"

"Alright," Nova said. "Here let me help." He blinked Mia back to Julian.

"What's up grandpa?" Emmia asked curiously.

"Well you see," Julian then repeated the same process to check that weird memory.

"Ummm, I see some floating letters," Emmia described with her eyes closed. "I think they mean my name."

Opening her eyes she asked, "what was that grandpa?"

"It's your memory space, every intelligent life has one. It stores your name and what your gift is," Julian explained.

"Oh," Emmia became downcast that she didn't have a gift yet.

"Don't worry, it just means you have yet to awaken your gift," Julian comforted. Emmia perked up and hugged Julian lightly before going back to chat with Nova.

An hour or so later the group had arrived at the training spot. It was grassland with a sparse amount of bushes and some long flowers. Some animals were roaming around the grassland, grazing and sleeping.

Nova teleported the trio on his head onto the grassland and then transformed into his humanoid form and landed on the ground.

Emmia and Icarth gazed at their uncle in wonder. Nova had shrunk by an unimaginable scale. Now only taller than Julian by an inch or so, Nova stood proudly. His void purple hair seemed to trap light within it, his eyes had become completely grey with a reptilian red iris. His face had become slightly less draconic with a more human nose and mouth, filled with pearly white teeth of course. His body was still covered with his void purple scales and his tail and horns had readjusted to properly fit his size.

Julian gave Nova a weird look, "You hate that form."

"I don't know what you're talking about," Nova replied, posing slightly, taking in the twins admiring stares.

"So cool," the twins said simultaneously.

Julian rolled his eyes, 'show off,' he scoffed.

Turning to the twins, Julian asked, "Before we start your training, do either of you know what energy we use to make use of our gifts?"

Icarth shook his head while Emmia jumped up and down answering, "oh, oh, I know, it's something called universal energy."

Julian chuckled, "That's right, universal energy is present everywhere and we use it to utilise our gifts."

"What does it look like?" Emmia asked curiously.

"We can't see universal energy through the simple eye, but we can feel it," Nova started to explain before Julian could. "Here take a feel of it."

Nova extended his arm and coalesced some universal energy from the surroundings. Following that, he let it flow harmlessly over Icarth and Emmia. Feeling the universal energy flow past her, Emmia giggled, "it feels smooth."

Ending his demonstration, Nova gestured for Julian to continue.

Sighing slightly, Julian continued, "Since you two haven't awakened your gifts yet, we're going to start with a different type of training. You two have to catch one of the rabbits that roam this meadow."